Architecture 34 / SPACESNEPAL.COM
Architecture ‘THE FIRST AND THE ONLY ONE ARCHITECTURE GALLERY IN NEPAL’ Rohit K Ranjitkar, The Country Director of KVPT How KVPT initiated the establishment of the Architectural Galleries? The monuments started falling and decaying with the smack of the great earthquake of 1934. It is obvious that the rescue of living beings is given the first priority in the time of crisis and the arts and heritages are left out-of-the-way. The devastated major monuments were hastily reconstructed during a period of material scarcity after the earthquake, leaving many buildings in a fragile condition. KVPT, in association with The Department of Archaeology of The Government of Nepal, has been working to safeguard the historic architecture of the Kathmandu Valley. Over the past two decades KVPT has restored over 50 buildings throughout the valley including palaces, temples, monasteries, and homes. Since 2006 KVPT has been working primarily on the complete restoration and adaptive re-use of the historical palace complex adjacent to Patan Durbar square. A number of organizations and individuals including The Department of Archaeology of The Government of Nepal, US Ambassadors Fund for Cultural Preservation, The Government of The Federal Republic of Germany, Prince Claus Fund for Culture And Development, The Prince’s Charities, Sumitomo Foundation, Nepal Investment Bank, Lamu Amatya, Ludwig Kuttner & Beatrix Ost, Prithivi B. Pande & Pratima Pande, University of Applied Arts in Vienna have supported to make the restoration project a success. Patan Palace Restoration Project is KVPT’s largest program of works to date, encompassing the restoration and conservation of 2 major palace courtyards, 3 tiered temples, 2 Shah-period public buildings, a water tank, a step-well, a rest-house, and a large urban garden. The oldest inscription in the area dates back to a Licchavi monastery from the 8th century, but most of the existing structures were built by the Malla kings in the 17th century. The palace was abandoned by royalty in 1769 when the Shah dynasty captured the Malla kingdoms and shifted the seat of power to Kathmandu. Over the course of the 20th century the monuments of the Patan Palace were encroached by various government offices for other purposes leaving it suffer from neglect and decay. Sundari Chowk, for example, housed police station at the time when a documentation project started in 1993. Similarly, the negative impact of today’s development pressures has been another threat for the monuments in this square. With the mission of safeguarding the threatened architectural heritage, KVPT launched The Patan Palace Restoration Project. Though the Architecture Gallery was not in original plan, with an objective of preserving the monuments and making the palace self sustaining, we established architecture gallery. This is the first and the only one architecture gallery in Nepal. How far is the dream to come true? Besides the complete restoration of the Patan durbar complex, the gallery is under development and there are a lot of things to do. We are focused on the elements of the architecture like tundals and pillars and we have been able to exhibit only a few things. We have only been able to give the captions but the sub captions for individual exhibit are yet to be given. Now we are working on the north wing. We are thinking about the possibility of establishing a proper audio-visual exhibition area with an objective of contributing for the proper documentation and archiving. We have not been able to make the proper use of the rooms at Mulchowk yet. We are thinking of allocating a space for the temporary exhibition of rescued monuments, too. Mulchowk Gallery exhibits objects whereas we are planning to make Sundari Chowk, which is under restoration, a gallery of drawings and facsimiles of historic paintings. Your dream as a conservation architect? Nepal’s identity is its architecture. There is only ours in our architecture; our architecture is originally ours. I wish all the monuments were preserved - It can be one of the main resources for our prosperity. There seems to be a misconception about the monuments: only the temples, palaces and idol are not monuments; surrounding atmosphere including private houses are also monuments. It should be taken as a composite whole and, thus, the development or other construction should go well with the surrounding atmosphere of the space. I wish the owners of the private house as well would step ahead for the preservation of monuments. May every individual be conscious of its importance and start preserving monuments right from individual level! june <strong>2014</strong> / 35